AS BEREANS DID: Old/New Covenant Law

Showing posts with label Old/New Covenant Law. Show all posts

Thursday, July 16, 2026

Jesus Came To Reveal Spiritual Things

The ministry of Jesus shifted the focus from external rule-keeping to the spiritual realities those rules could never produce. This article examines what that means for the Sabbath.

Examine the Beatitudes. They are all about having a converted mindset in relation to the things being discussed by Him. He concludes this part of his preaching with this:

(Matthew 5:16) Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

The attributes mentioned are those of a converted person; not the attributes of those of evil people whom God described through Jeremiah as having deceitful and desperately wicked hearts.

As for those being referred to in the opening remarks of Matthew chapter 5, Jesus states that their works are good works, where men who witness them glorify their Father in Heaven.

What happens if these people, followers of Christ Jesus, were to carry out good works on the Sabbath?

Those with the deceitful and desperately wicked hearts, who are deceived by their own hearts who think themselves religious, would do to them what they did to Jesus: declare His works - His GOOD works - to be evil and sin on the Sabbath; opting for the law that commanded no one do “any” work on the Sabbath, not even so much as preparing a meal.

Verse 16 is being overlooked by the “religious” of today; obscured and overshadowed by those who constantly refer to verse 17, claiming the law remains inviolate down to jots and tittles.

An average man on the street, not so ‘obsessive’ over the law as were the Pharisees, might well have witnessed Jesus perform a miracle of healing - the alleviation of afflictions by Jesus on the Sabbath - resulting in that person glorifying the Father in Heaven, from awe and wonder of having witnessed events never seen by any of them or their forefathers, such as a man born blind made to see, and the resurrection of the dead back to life.

Not so with the Pharisees and others of like ‘mind’, who attributed Christ’s miracles to the ‘glory’ of the devil simply because such a wonderous miracle was done on the Sabbath day.

Paul wrote the law is not of faith. He also wrote that there exists now a law of faith; a law of the Spirit. Those under the old(er) blood covenant law were dealt with almost exclusively with laws, rites and rituals that were physical in nature; physically oriented for a physically, carnally-minded people. Now, with Christ, a spiritual aspect is revealed, non-corporeal, dealing entirely with the heart, mind, and soul of people (the inward man), in a condition foreign to the things the blood covenant law dealt with. The blood covenant law dealt with those possessed of a deceitful and desperately wicked heart; commanding them, for the most part, to refrain from doing evils through force of will in obedience to regulations. Don’t commit adultery. Don’t commit murder. Don’t bear false witness. Don’t steal. Don’t have other gods. Don’t even desire or lust after that which belongs to another.

What is fascinating is how easily a deceptive and desperately wicked heart will rationalize and circumvent these commandments, and more, from either direction.

An otherwise good work is condemned by them if performed on their Sabbath. After all, they rationalize, “any” work is forbidden.

Then it all flips with other laws, such as not to commit murder. First, let’s define murder. It is the unlawful taking of another’s life without due process of the law in order to determine if a killing was justified or not. Capital punishment is prescribed by the law and carried out by those duly charged with doing so. Some killings were and are justified due to defense of one’s self or family, or even a third party. Same as in conditions of war. However, it is all flipped over when it comes to the destruction of the most innocent of lives; something Jesus specifically related was evil, that has been happening in Adventist hospitals since the early 1970’s, beginning with the Adventist Hospital located in Kailua, Hawaii -- Castle Hospital.

The same Adventists who will turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the destruction of innocent life, an act which God calls evil, will revile you and charge you with sin for doing a good work, influenced by the Holy Spirit in you, if done on their Sabbath.

Can it get any more perverse than that?

But here’s the issue. They are mindful of the physical things at the expense of the spiritual.
They judge all based on the physical, grounded in being observational. They do not ‘see’ the Spirit or actions motivated by the Spirit. The motivation for all is the carnally-oriented law; not the law of the Spirit. They are blind to the Spirit and law of the Spirit, especially when it comes to the Sabbath commandment, which they embrace as the one thing they can rely on to keep up the outward appearance of obedience to the law, while behind closed doors the destruction of life takes place.

They should all be ashamed ...but they are not.
They fall back on the Sabbath and their ‘dedication’ to it. Notice then the parallel with this passage, attributed to God speaking:

(Amos 8:4-7) Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail, Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit? That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat? The LORD hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I will never forget any of their works.

The solution of those ancient people was to persecute and kill the prophets who exposed their hypocrisies. Note well their dedication to the Sabbath, suspending their evil works on that day. These are the same kind of people who later condemned Jesus for working on the Sabbath; doing good works He declared lawful.

They needed the Sabbath. It was the cloak for their deceitful and desperately wicked hearts, where all was judged by the letter of the law and the appearance that afforded them.

Tell an Adventist today that good works are lawful on their fake sabbath day, tell them that even Jesus worked on the Sabbath, and some will respond with an accusation against you for you claiming Jesus sinned! It is that perverse heart trying to desperately maintain its cover through an attempt at accusing you; bearing false witness against you, where in their own minds they believe themselves compliant; ‘obedient’ to that law that is not of faith.

The New Covenant in Christ is not like the Old. It is entirely different, designed for different people. The old(er) blood covenant dealt with evil-hearted people, sinful by nature, tripping them up in their own deceit and deceptions. The new is a law of life for those with the new spiritual heart provided to them by God; His Holy Spirit dwelling IN the believer, guiding and leading him or her, and not a law designed to condemn the guilty; the evil ones with the evil hearts of unbelief; the deceitful and desperately wicked hearts of stone, who were aptly given a law engraved in stone; the same law set elevated by Adventists, given the attributes of God, making it another god besides God.

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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Tuesday, July 14, 2026

Righteous Judgment

Does God judge people by what they do, or by the heart that produces those works? The answer lies at the center of the Sabbath debate.

In Adventism and other Sabbatarian circles, the heart is judged according to the works; works of the law such as the Sabbath.

With God and righteous judgment, works are judged according to the heart.

(1 Samuel 16:7) But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart.

Christ Jesus, God Incarnate, commanded the people to judge righteous judgment and not according to appearance in relation to His working on the Sabbath, performing works of love and compassion, which are attributes of the Holy Spirit, in relation to those afflicted and suffering.

Knowing full well how big Adventists are on following the commandments of God, I reiterate this commandment of God Incarnate that “we” are commanded to judge righteous judgment, looking to the heart and intent of heart, and not according to appearance. Which, in Jesus’ example, He was being judged by the religious elite and others as guilty of sin for having worked on the Sabbath, doing good works He declared lawful on the Sabbath; good works as contrasted to evil works.

Sabbatarians not only neglect to judge righteous judgment when it comes to the Sabbath, they adamantly refuse to do so. In Adventist theology, the heart is defined by the work where to transgress the Sabbath commandment by working on the Sabbath is to sin due to how they interpret sin, that being the transgression of the law, citing the flawed English translation of 1John 3:4 that they embrace, tenaciously, and to the exclusion of all other passages of Scripture that deal with and define sin.

You know them by their fruits, and judging others according to appearance is not categorized by God as good fruits. Doing so is an evil fruit; unrighteous judgment. It is disguised as good fruit by claiming the Sabbath law to be a “moral” law; a moral imperative, where a “good” work is interpreted to mean an approved work that meets their approval, where they judge the work and not the heart of the person producing the work. A work not meeting their approval is an evil, sinful work, regardless of motive, seeing as the Sabbath is a moral law.

God commanded the Hebrews, the legal party to that older covenant law, to keep the Sabbath by refraining from doing “any” work on the Sabbath… this from God who says He judges according to the heart. And when it came to the hearts of those Hebrews, He had this to relate:

(Jeremiah 17:9) The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

(Jeremiah 32:30) For the children of Israel and the children of Judah have only done evil before me from their youth: for the children of Israel have only provoked me to anger with the work of their hands, saith the LORD.

God’s righteous judgment, based on the heart, meant that any and all their works were evil in His sight.

Hence, the restriction against “any” work they might have done on the Sabbath.

Then Jesus comes on the scene in the flesh and proclaims good works lawful on the Sabbath; good works they were incapable of truly performing, due to their evil, wicked hearts.

I reiterate here that those with this deceitful and desperately wicked hearts judge others, and even themselves, according to appearance; outward shows with no regard for what lays within, such as those with good hearts provided to the believers and followers of Christ Jesus how have responded positively to the Gospel declaration, being in receipt of a “new heart” from God.

They see — they witness people, Christians with the “new heart”, working on what they believe to be the Sabbath, and automatically conclude those people, those Christians, sin by doing so, based solely on outward appearance. You work on their Sabbath, and you sin. Period. Because “sin is the transgression of the law”, and you transgressed the law; the Sabbath law. The sign of that older covenant God made with the Hebrews with the evil hearts of unbelief whose works were all evil in the sight of God.

Adventists have to ignore much of Scripture in order to embrace the Sabbath of the old covenant, such as what Paul wrote in 1Timothy:

(1 Timothy 1:9-11) Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, °For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine; °According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust.

Who are these righteous ones? Those whose righteousness was derived through faith; those who were given the “new heart” by God, that is a “good heart”, that results in good fruits ONLY, even if done on what Adventists believe to be the Sabbath, which has been rendered obsolete by Christianity and the New Covenant.

(Hebrews 8:13) In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

(Hebrews 10:9) Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second.

The Adventist / Sabbatarian proof text drawn like a gun to “prove” sin is the result of transgressing the law states in the first half of that verse that sin also transgresses the law. Any sin, any evil or iniquitous act, in turn transgressed the law, resulting in a charge of sin, with the attendant punishment prescribed as a result: a death sentence. That law was a blood covenant law, where the death was prescribed by the law, where one’s blood was to be spilled out upon the ground, was met, was satisfied, was paid in full, through the sacrifice of Christ for sin.

So why are Sabbatarians invoking the law that has already been satisfied; the sin-debt paid for?

Their twisted sense of justice remains unfulfilled. They want others to join them in their dissimulation where righteousness through faith is derailed, replaced with a righteousness derived through outward appearance - "keeping" the Sabbath - regardless of the inward condition of one’s heart. Righteous judgment is dodged, avoided, replaced with unrighteous judgment, according to appearance; according to how carnal man judges others and himself. And using the law as the means to do so.

This is why the (their) Sabbath day is so rabidly defended. It is their religious yardstick they use to judge and deceive others with, and even themselves. Desperately wicked hearts trying to appear morally upright while sating the need to denigrate others perceived as inferior to themselves with the Sabbath being the determining factor in this comparison of the self with others.

It is appearance over substance of heart.

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Acts 17:11

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Sunday, July 12, 2026

Sin and Sabbath

The Pharisees condemned Jesus as a Sabbath breaker. This article argues that many Sabbatarians make the very same judgment - and for the same reason.

(John 9: 16) Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them.

The consensus of both the Pharisees and “others” was that Jesus did not keep the Sabbath. The Pharisees concluded Jesus was a sinner by reason of the fact He did not keep the Sabbath. He worked on the Sabbath. They watched Him, “witnessed” Him, work on the Sabbath. The Pharisees, like Sabbatarians today, concluded that working on the Sabbath breaks or transgresses the Sabbath commandment of the Decalogue, resulting in sin. Even Jesus’ disciple at the time witnessed Jesus break the Sabbath, and stated so in John 5:18, right after citing Jesus’ admission that He worked on the Sabbath.

Ask a Sabbatarian to define sin and he or she will cite the second half of 1John 3:4 that states in the KJV, “… sin is the transgression of the law.”

This is not about what sin “is.” The whole verse tells you what sin does. By taking part of the verse out of context, and interpreting that according to modern English instead of how the language was used over 400 years ago when the KJV was written. A false perception results that negates a declarative statement made by Jesus: “Good works are lawful on the Sabbath” which He further contrasted to evil works.

There are good works, and there are evil works.

Sabbatarians wasted no time in redefining good works to mean something not supported by the context of what Jesus said and taught, so that “good works” morphs into “approved” works where Sabbatarians become their own authority on the matter. Jesus’ explanation of good and evil works is totally ignored, where only good people can and do produce good works, only, and more importantly, only bad/evil people can and do produce evil works (Matthew 7:17-18).

Sabbatarianism recoils at the very thought that any and all good works produced by Christians - “good trees” done on their sabbath idol - are not sinful as a result, forcing them to twist and contort even what Jesus declared in an effort to insulate their sabbath idol from destruction.

Every imaginable and conceivable excuse and rationalization is employed to build a hedge around their idol in order to make it impervious to criticism as well as “doubling down” on emphasizing its overarching importance to the world, so that even the Gospel succumbs to its influence.

Sin is any evil, any iniquity, that is based in action or thought.

Why do Sabbatarians ignore the first half of 1 John 3:4?

It is because the Greek word used for sin there actually defines sin, and it is a definition with ramifications that Sabbatarianism tacitly rejects.

The Greek word for sin at the beginning of 1 John 3:4 is “hamartia.” In Greek, it means “missing the mark” like shooting an arrow at a target and missing it. “The transgression of the law” comes from the one Greek word, “anomia” (against law) which reinforces the actual definition of sin and how sin is “against law” that, in this progression of the statement, ends up invoking the condemnation of law; a death penalty.

Sabbatarianism bypasses the first condition of missing the mark and reconstructs the whole concept of sin into just transgressing the law, so that transgression of the Sabbath commandment results in evil / iniquity / lawlessness in one fell swoop, which is what the Pharisees did with Christ Jesus. They too circumvented the progression so as to make something “sin” that wasn’t sin, and that circumvention was in itself a sin.

Missing the mark / hamartia provides us with only part of the picture. It doesn’t tell us specifically what the “target” or “goal” was that was being missed.

(Romans 3:23) For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;

This reveals the target: the Glory of God. The perfection of God. This is what sin falls short of.

When it comes to a person defined by God as evil / sinful / iniquitous, there is nothing they can do to “hit that target” or even come close to it. An evil person cannot by any measure achieve unto the Glory of God. The absolute “best” they could do was to refrain from their otherwise evil works and even their evil imagination. This brings up an interesting point.

(ISA. 58:13) If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words:

They could “honor” God by NOT doing those things they normally did - seeking their own “pleasure”, their own desires, even their own lusts. God wanted them to be focused in on Him when it came to the Sabbath, where this passage states what they were really thinking about on the Sabbath:

(Amos 8:5) Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah small, and the shekel great, and falsifying the balances by deceit?

Now, an important observation.

I would simply point out at this setting that Christians do every day what the Hebrews were called to do on the Sabbath.

What did Jesus do, on the Sabbath, that we would agree was to the Glory of God and that we can contrast to the works of mankind who were incapable of doing anything to the Glory of God?

Everything.

Everything He did, whether on the Sabbath or otherwise, were works to the Glory of God. He healed people of diseases and afflictions and the people gave praise to the Glory of God ...but not the Pharisees. They remained adamant, hard-hearted, refusing to give Glory to God for the miracles wrought by Christ Jesus, thereby showing their contempt and hatred for both He and the Father in Heaven. They attributed His works to the ‘glory of the devil.’

Compare this now to the works of Christians, wrought in and through the Holy Spirit now dwelling in them, where all their works are now a reflection of God who now dwells in them, so that all their works, all the fruits of these “good trees”, are to the Glory of God.

There is no “missing the mark.”

Evil people not only cannot produce good fruits/works, they also deny the good fruits/works of those called of God and given the Holy Spirit, whose fruits are now wrought in God to the Glory of God. They call the good works of Christians "evil" and "sin", using the Sabbath as justification for doing so.

Sabbatarians, like their predecessors the Pharisees, call good, evil, and evil, good. The works of a Christian, now motivated by the Holy Spirit in them - with the “new heart” and “new law of God” in them - are viewed by Sabbatarians as works of the devil, performed by the servants of the devil, for the faithful Christians trod on the sabbath idol of Sabbatarianism where they do all to the glory of their sabbath.

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Acts 17:11

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Saturday, July 11, 2026

Did Jesus Declare All Foods Clean In Mark 7:19?

Did Jesus really declare and end to certain laws? Some translations include this wording while others do not. Why is there a disagreement and which is right? This article explores the evidence.

Let's start at the start.

It was a Pharisaical tradition to wash your hands in a special way before eating. It wasn't just for dirt's sake, but for ritual cleanliness. The Pharisees would often take a legitimate biblical idea then expand the boundaries around it to prevent anyone from crossing a legitimate line. The intentions were good. If you don't cross our new boundaries, then you are certainly safe from crossing the old boundaries. The idea with the hand washing was, if you had unknowingly touched something unclean, then washing your hands would remove the ceremonial uncleanliness before you had the chance to spread it to other things, like your food. And therefore food could not make your whole body ritually unclean.
But things like this resulted in pushback from Jesus.

It is important that you keep in mind this hand washing ritual was all about ceremonial cleanliness; clean and unclean; holy vs common. And ceremonial cleanliness was all about making a person or a thing fit to occupy sacred space, like the Temple. The closer you got to God's holy and pure presence, the more ritually clean you had to be. (We will go into this more a bit later.)

Jesus' did not encourage His disciples to wash in this way before eating. Certain Pharisees asked Jesus why not. Judging by Jesus' strong reaction, this must have been more than an innocent question by the Pharisees. Jesus' answer was about how the various washings and rituals were undoing God's intent not just for the ceremonial law but God's intent for Israel to understand what the real defilement was in their lives in the first place. Jesus then explained to the crowd how it wasn't what goes into you but what comes out of you that can truly defile you.

When the disciples asked Jesus about this, He explained that the real issue was matters of the heart: evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil look, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. God's greater concern was not with outward displays of ritual purity and various washings, but with inward moral character.
The Pharisees had been expanding boundaries in all the wrong places. Doing the one but leaving the other undone.

It is in Jesus’ explanation to the disciples that the disputed line appears in Mark 7:19.

CEREMONIAL VS MORAL

Now for the hard question:
What about Jesus' response indicates He was concerned with voiding ceremonial cleanliness laws?
I see nothing of the sort at all. The conversation was not about legitimate Old Covenant laws. The conversation was not about pork.

Just like with Mark 2:27, Jesus' answer can seem quite jarring if we aren't paying attention to the flow of the conversation, because it is easy to misunderstand.

The Pharisees had taken ritual cleanliness rules that applied to the priesthood and expanded them to the common person - with good intentions. But in focusing on the ceremonial, they lost sight of the moral. Jesus passed judgment on the Pharisees multiple times (read Matthew 23 or John 8). Rarely do we see a Pharisee responding with, "I did not realize, and I am sorry for my behavior." or "Wait! I did not do what you accuse me of." Rather, they reacted with offense and pride and anger. "How dare you, an illegitimate son from a back water village, judge us, the teachers of Israel?!"
That is the crux of the conversation. All the handwashing in the world did nothing to protect them from what really mattered. They had neither recognized God Himself in their presence, nor recognized their own sin that was bringing them to the point where they would murder the very Author of the Law they so treasured. And no amount of washing was going to help this.

Which of these makes more sense?

A) [Pharisees]: Clean foods defile you with dirty hands. [Jesus]: Dirt is secondary. Sins from the heart are what truly defile you.
-or-
B) [Pharisees]: Clean foods defile you with dirty hands. [Jesus]: Not any more they don't. Meats laws are gone. Peace out! [mic drop]

I'm going with A!

IS IT REALLY IN THERE?

You may have heard people claiming the words "Thus he declared all foods clean" did not come from the pen of Mark. That's not exactly true. This is considered to be a legitimate verse. The validity of the verse is not in dispute, it's the translation that's in dispute. Let's see two very different ways this verse is translated:

(MAR. 7: 19) [ESV] ...since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.)

(MAR. 7: 19) [NKJV] ...because it does not enter his heart but his stomach, and is eliminated, thus purifying all foods?”

Same verse. Same Greek. Very different English.

At the heart of the difference in translation is what did Mark mean by 'all foods'. One translation takes it as a declaration about ending ceremonial clean and unclean meats laws. The other takes it as the continuation of Jesus' argument that lapses in ritual purity were never the real problem.

Both translations are technically acceptable ways to render the Greek. Yes! Both are technically acceptable translations. However, one of them does not cleanly follow the flow of the conversation.

I side with the NKJV's translation, and I think the parallel account in Matthew 15 supports this conclusion.

THE HEART OF THE MATTER

I said we would come to this later, and so we shall. Let's briefly remind ourselves why ceremonial cleanliness laws exist in the first place.

The ceremonial cleanliness rituals in Torah were not arbitrary. It wasn't a matter of health. It wasn't a matter of personal hygiene. It wasn't a matter of the nature of animals and pots and fluids. The rituals were about making a person or a thing fit to occupy sacred space. God is pure and perfect. (No. That's not strong enough.) God is absolutely pure, and utterly perfect. (Yes, that's better.) Things which enter His holy presence must be purified. Sometimes He makes allowances, such as when He met with Moses in the form of a burning bush and only asked Moses to remove his shoes. But when Israel was required to come into His holy presence, they had to perform far more complex purity rituals. The closer you got to God, the more ritually pure you were expected to be. There was another level for the priests who worked in the Temple. And there was still yet another level for the High Priest who went into the Holy of Holies once a year. All ceremonial cleanliness rituals were about making a person or object fit to occupy sacred space. Most of the sin offering rituals were not really about forgiving sin but rather about ritual purification. A disinfection, so to speak. This is what clean and unclean is all about; ceremonial purity and symbolizing fitness to be in God's presence.

In the time before Jesus' perfect and invaluable sacrifice purified to the uttermost all who accept it, there had to be a shadow of purification, a symbol. The Gentiles had absolutely nothing. And the Jews would also have had nothing, but God provided a means to symbolically purify them until Messiah could come.

The law did not require ritual hand washings before meals as a condition of entering sacred space. The law regulated what things could be eaten or worn or touched, and the law regulated certain priestly washings, but the law said nothing about regular Israelite's hands transmitting uncleanliness to regular food and then onto the body... which was what the Pharisees hoped to prevent when they made the rule about hand washing.
So, why would Jesus declare an end to one part of the legitimate law as a solution to an issue that had nothing to do with those legitimate laws, in a conversation that had nothing to do with those legitimate laws?

I see no good reason to agree that He did.

Jesus did not counter from the law but from common sense. You eat, you digest, you eliminate - but none of this touches the moral failures which begin in the heart.

Fixating on symbolism and requiring others to do so was distracting from the underlying meaning God enacted cleanliness laws for in the first place. All the purification rituals in Israel could never actually take away sin (HEB. 10:11). Jesus was speaking beyond holiness and onto righteousness. Jesus was cutting to the heart of the matter: sin is real, and it can have no part with a holy and righteous God, and the water was not literally washing away anything that truly mattered. Deal with your sin first (MAT. 23:25-26). Or, to put it another way, deal with righteousness first and then you are free to attend to holiness. This is the same lesson He gave in Matthew 5:

(MAT. 5:23-24) 23 Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

And if you think about it, this is the same thing Jesus was addressing in the ritual foot cleansing during His final Passover with the Apostles (read John 13, especially verses 10 & 11).

Here is the crux of my argument: If ceremonies in the first place cannot solve the issue, then removing the ritual laws also does not solve the issue. Therefore, that isn't what Jesus was doing.

FINAL POINTS

When we look at it this way, the verse no longer reads like Jesus declaring an end to Old Covenant meats laws. Therefore, the NKJV translation fits the narrative better. That is not to say He could not have done so. He had the authority. But I do not see anything here that leads me to believe He intended to.

This is where I pull out an old favorite verse:
(MAT. 5: 17-18) 17 Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. 18 For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.

I am not citing this selection to claim the law continues forever. I am citing it to demonstrate that it was not Jesus' intention to simply declare things away.

Jesus came to genuinely solve the issue. He did not come to circumvent by declaring an end to certain laws. He did not come to take the easy route. He was going to do it the hard way; the only real way. He did not permit Himself the option of simply making declarations. He came to fulfill fully, to keep Israel's end of the Covenant for them perfectly, as the true Israel of God, and when that was accomplished, He would die to cleanse us all and solve the issue at its very heart and root.

Lastly, let's skip ahead to Peter's Sheet Vision in Acts 10. When God said, "Rise, Peter; kill and eat," Peter responded, “Not so, Lord! For I have never eaten anything common or unclean.” (v14.) Peter was quite adamant. This response would make no sense at all if Peter was fully aware that Jesus removed foods laws in Mark 7. The Gospel of Mark is traditionally considered to be Peter's version of events, after all.

CONCLUSION

Did Jesus declare all foods clean in Mark 7: 19?

No.

As Bereans Did has always said we would happily point out where Herbert Armstrong got things right, and we think he did here, at least to a degree.
However....
If Jesus did not declare meats clean in Mark 7, does that mean meats laws are still in effect for all Christians and we can proof-text Isaiah 66:17?

Also no.
...but not because of Mark 7:19.

The answer to that question can be found in Jesus' perfect sacrifice that permanently cleanses and truly takes away sin, which tore the curtain and opened our way straight to the Father, and which ended the Old Covenant with its terms and symbols and rituals and distinctions between Jew and Gentile. We go over this in other articles.

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Acts 17:11

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Saturday, July 4, 2026

The Sabbath Rest of Mark 2

Does the phrase "the Sabbath was made for man" in Mark 2:27 indicate the Sabbath was made on day 7 of Creation Week and is binding on all mankind? This article looks at that interaction from several angles and discovers there is so much more to consider.

In "The Sabbath Rest of John 14", we saw how the word "commandments" in English Bible translations rarely refers to the Ten Commandments, and never on its own, and that such help is missing in John 14. So, we naturally conclude the Sabbath is missing from John 14.

Today, we will go over another very popular selection: Mark 2:27-28.

Clearly, there is a Sabbath here. That's not the issue. Instead, we need to look at three related issues.

The first is the phrase "made for man". Sabbatarians claim it means "made for all mankind." Does it, or does it mean something else?
The second is the claim that verse 27 supports a weekly Sabbath at creation. Did we neglect to review this verse in our article "The Sabbath Rest of Genesis 2", or does it mean something else?
The third is the claim that since Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath, then the Sabbath is binding in the New Covenant. Can this phrase support this, and only this?

Or, to put it another way, the Sabbath is there, but are we reading about its nature or its scope?

Let's start with one of the things we hammer away at here: context, context, context.

THE CONTEXT

To get an idea on what these two verses mean, we should take them as part of the conversation they were in. So, let's see that conversation.

(MAR. 2: 23-26) 23 Now it happened that He went through the grainfields on the Sabbath; and as they went His disciples began to pluck the heads of grain. 24 And the Pharisees said to Him, “Look, why do they do what is not lawful on the Sabbath?” 25 But He said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he was in need and hungry, he and those with him: 26 how he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the showbread, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests, and also gave some to those who were with him?”

The disciples were accused of violating the law for gathering food on the Sabbath. There are a couple of things to notice here.
First, gathering food on the Sabbath really was understood to be a violation of Torah. This wasn't just some Pharisaical tradition, like hand washing.
Second, Jesus never denies the accusation that they had violated the Sabbath. Rather than argue that the accusation was false, He argued that they were guiltless. He defends His disciples by appealing to examples where human need and mercy outweighed a rigid application of the law.
He used David violating of the law and being guiltless as His defense. They were guiltless because they did not act in contempt but out of need. A key comes from the parallel account in Matthew 12:7 “But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless.”

The most important thing to bear in mind is that Jesus' words were defending the disciples. That is critical to the context. Context is key.

QUALITY OR QUANTITY

With that context filled in, now we come to verses 27 and 28.

(MAR. 2: 27-28) 27 And He said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. 28 Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.”

The Sabbatarian explanation takes verses 27 & 28 in complete isolation, apart from any context, and goes like this:

[Pharisees] Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath.
[Jesus] Yes, but they are guiltless because the Sabbath was created on day 7 and was made for every single human. And therefore, the Son of Man is Lord of it. And since the Son of Man is Lord of it, it also applies in the New Covenant which doesn't exist yet.

I was a little tongue-in-cheek there, but not inaccurate. But we must ask, does that interpretation fit? In my view, no. It does not.

It does not make sense in the cultural and legal context of Israel, as everyone there was Jewish, during the Old Covenant period, and they believed the Sabbath was for the Jews only. Jesus expanding the scope of the Sabbath would certainly have caused new and even greater issues.
It does not make sense in the context of the conversation. It reads as if Jesus suddenly leapt into a completely different conversation.
It does not make sense that because the scope of the Sabbath was far greater than anyone realized therefore Jesus gets to be Lord of it. Make that make sense.
It does not make sense as a legal defense. The disciples were guiltless because the Sabbath is far more binding than anyone realized? How does that make them guiltless? It doesn't. Jesus' defense was not, "Well, everyone else on earth is guilty, too!"
It does not make sense in that Matthew says nothing of it. In the synoptic parallel in Matthew 12, Jesus doesn't come anywhere close to saying the Sabbath is binding on all mankind. But He does defend the disciples. How can the scope of the Sabbath be His primary point if Matthew says nothing of it?
But worst of all, it does not make sense in that it indicts Jesus Himself. As their teacher, He was responsible for what He let them do. If His comments were about the scope of the Sabbath, then He conceded that everyone is guilty, including Himself.

I offer a different way to understand these verses:

[Pharisees] Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath.
[Jesus] Yes, but they are guiltless ... because they ate out of need. The Sabbath was meant to lift burdens not cause them. And since it was meant to be a blessing, the Son of Man is Lord of it and has authority to declare these men guiltless.

David broke the law and was guiltless. The priests regularly broke the Sabbath law and were guiltless. His disciples broke the Sabbath law and were guiltless. In short, the law allowed for violations done in need (for example, certain police actions were necessary, as in NUM. 15:32-34) and in ignorance (NUM. 15:22-26). The disciples were not ignorant, nor were they acting wantonly. Their motivation was need. The Pharisees were not allowing for any of that. Their main concern seemed to be that the Sabbath was paramount and it had been violated. Jesus was explaining to the Pharisees how the Sabbath was never intended to be what they had made it into (MAT. 23:4,23). Their priorities were backward.

That said, it wasn't meant to crash into the other ditch, either. Jesus was not teaching that the Sabbath could be ignored whenever it became inconvenient (see "The Law Was Written On Our Hearts - Part I"). His disciples were not callously violating it. Wanton disregard for the Sabbath carried the death penalty (EXO. 35:2). But that was not the case here.

Jesus repeatedly showed that the Sabbath was never intended to prevent acts of mercy, necessity, and doing good. Even where the law had been legitimately violated, God desires mercy more than rules and regulations. Life, even an animal's life, was not to be sacrificed on the altar of rigid legalism. As He told the Pharisees, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice.” (MAT. 12: 7). This is the exact same point He made in Luke 13: 10-7 &15-17, 14:1-6, and John 5:1-18.

And perhaps most telling of all, both Matthew and Mark flow straight into yet another example of Jesus showing how it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath (MAT. 12:9-14; Mark 3: 1-6). That is no accident. Again, mercy is emphasized. Again, no mention of the Sabbath being binding on all mankind from creation.

(MAT. 12:12b) Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.

Here is the heart of what I'm getting at: Jesus's words in verses 27 & 28 were about the real nature of the Sabbath, not its scope. The quality, not the quantity.

Jesus was teaching the weightier matters of the law (MAT. 23:23). Sometimes rest is a blessing. But sometimes doing nothing when there is an obvious need is evil (MAT. 25:45). As James said:

(JAS. 2:13b) Mercy triumphs over judgment.

Neither Mark nor Matthew say, “Therefore all mankind was bound to the Sabbath from creation.” That conclusion is being read into the verse. That conclusion is not being reached because that is what these verses say, or even what they logically support, but because of other Sabbatarian commitments.

Now, let's do a deeper dive into the Greek.

ANTHROPOS

The Greek words translated "man" are anthrōpon (ἄνθρωπον) and anthrōpos (ἄνθρωπος). They are the same word. The difference is grammatical. With anthrōpon man is the object, and with anthrōpos man is the subject. The difference doesn't really matter for what we are after. I am going to refer to them both as anthrōpos because that is the root word. It makes life easier for me.

Anthrōpos is singular. It can mean "a man" or "mankind" in general. There isn't a slam dunk here in either direction. The word could technically support either explanation. It's what's missing that makes the bigger difference.

Consider that "humanity" (anthrōpos) is a category, not a quantity. Saying something was made "for man" is not the same thing as saying it was commanded for every human being who has ever lived.
Nature, not scope.

Perhaps an analogy might help.

Imagine going to the store to buy a men’s shirt, and saying, “This shirt was made for men. This must mean every man who has ever lived is required to wear it.” That would be ridiculous. “Men” tells you the nature of the shirt. It does not tell us the scope of who must wear it.

Yet that's the very leap the Sabbatarian interpretation makes. It inserts words like "all," and "every," into a verse that never says those things. Mark 2:27 says the Sabbath was made for humans, but it does not say all humans. It never says every member of mankind is obligated to keep it. If Mark had intended to say, "the Sabbath was made to be binding on all mankind," there were clearer ways to do that. Mark didn't use them. And Matthew says nothing at all.

When we plug anthrōpos back into the larger context, we find that even though it means mankind, Jesus' point had nothing to do with the Sabbath being universally binding from creation on every human being. His point was to defend His disciples and put the law back in its proper perspective versus how the Pharisees had interpreted it.
I appreciate the way the NLT puts verse 27:

[NLT] Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, and not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath.

That is what Jesus was getting at.

There is another aspect that we need to see.

WHEN?

It is not just that Sabbatarians interpret this verse as evidence for a universal Sabbath command for all mankind. It is also used to support the weekly Sabbath was made for all mankind at creation. I cannot agree these verses support that claim.

Consider, before we can accept that Mark 2:27 supports a weekly Sabbath from creation, we must already believe the weekly Sabbath was created in Genesis 2.
How so?

Notice how Mark 2:27 says "was made," but it does not say when. Of course the Sabbath was created. But how do we know this refers to Genesis 2 rather than Exodus 16? We don't! Again, this conclusion is imported into Mark from other places.
But what other places? There are no other prooftexts to point to other than Genesis 2. We went over this in detail in "The Sabbath Rest of Genesis 2", but let's skim it again as a reminder.

Genesis 2 says the seventh day of creation was sanctified and blessed. Why? Because on it God ceased from His work of creation, and wished to enjoy what He had made. But it says nothing about every seventh day. The Bible does not say that rest was repeated. Nor does it say the rest applied to anyone at all but God. The Bible does not say Adam rested. Adam had nothing to rest from! He was hours old and had no sin. The Bible does not say the weekly Sabbath started in Genesis 2. We can clearly see the weekly Sabbath pulls imagery from creation, but not that it was literally instituted at creation.

Without Genesis 2 saying there was a weekly Sabbath at creation, where else can we go to prove out this claim? Nowhere! Except Mark 2. And we've seen it isn't here in Mark 2 either. I did not forget to mention Mark 2 in my "The Sabbath Rest of Genesis 2" post. I left it out on purpose because it has nothing to do with it.

So, Genesis doesn't say this and Mark doesn't say this, yet Mark is being used as evidence for Genesis and Genesis for Mark. We must first assume things into both places in order to get them to point at one another. This flirts with circular reasoning - using something as evidence for itself.
How do we know Genesis 2 says the Sabbath was made at creation? Because of Mark 2.
How do we know Mark 2 says the Sabbath was made at creation? Because of Genesis 2.

But if neither of them say that, then how can they both say that together?

Given all that, which makes more sense?

A) The Sabbath was made at creation and the whole world is guilty, including Me. And because of this, therefore I am Lord of the Sabbath, and now everyone must keep the Sabbath in the New Covenant which doesn't exist yet.
or
B) The reason the Sabbath was created was to bless you; you were not created to bless the Sabbath. And because it was meant to be a blessing, I am Lord of the Sabbath, and I have authority to declare the disciples guiltless.

As for me, I'm going with B.

NEW COVENANT

Lastly, we must consider one more Sabbatarian claim. That being, since Jesus is Lord of the Sabbath, that makes the Sabbath binding in the New Covenant.
Does that follow? No.

This is a third scope change. First, the scope of the Sabbath was expanded to include all mankind. Second, the scope of the Sabbath was changed so that it began at Creation Week. Now it is being expanded to include all time going forward. I do not agree these few words can support that much doctrinal weight. Notice, nothing in Jesus' statement directly says anything about Covenants or the future. So, where are these conclusions coming from? Not the text.

Consider that this encounter did not happen in the New Covenant. New Testament, yes, but not New Covenant. They aren't the same thing. There was no New Covenant at that time. Chances are good that no one there besides Jesus had any idea that a New Covenant was imminent. Claiming that Jesus' lordship binds a law to the New Covenant makes absolutely no sense at all without quite a lot more explanation.

On top of that, the claim is inconsistent with other Sabbatarian beliefs. Jesus did not present Himself as Lord of the Sabbath alone, to the exclusion of everything else. He had always been Lord of the Sabbath. He had always been Lord of the entire Old Covenant.
Why is that important? Because if Christ's lordship over the Sabbath proves the Sabbath continues, then by the same reasoning His lordship over the rest of the Covenant would prove that all of it continues. Every law; even the ceremonial laws. (For example, Jesus was Lord of the Levitical Priesthood, therefore the Levitical Priesthood is binding in the New Covenant. Or circumcision. Or exclusion of the Gentiles.) There can be no New Covenant because the Old Covenant cannot end because Jesus is Lord of it. And that simply is not in line with most anyone's beliefs.
We cannot say, "The Sabbath continues, but not those other things. Oh! And the rest of the Ten Commandments. And meats laws. And tithes. And holy days, too. But not those other things."

So why did Jesus say He was Lord of the Sabbath? It was part of His defense. In the context of the conversation, I believe He was asserting His authority to put the Sabbath in its proper perspective and to declare the disciples guiltless. His statement was not particularly about the Sabbath but about Himself. Therefore, He was not saying anything about the scope of the Sabbath.

CONCLUSION

We’ve looked at the context, the Greek, the synoptic parallel in Matthew, as well as similar passages. Taken together, does the evidence show Jesus declaring His disciples innocent, or the world guilty?

The disciples were in need, not acting in careless disregard. Jesus responded with mercy, putting the Sabbath into proper context. This falls directly in line with other places where Jesus repeatedly taught it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath. He did not weaken the covenant law by showing mercy, but neither did He turn this moment into a declaration that the whole world was under indictment. And most certainly, He was not indicting Himself in the process.

Taken together, does the evidence show Jesus declaring the Sabbath binding from creation? No. That must be assumed in from other places.
Mark 2 and Genesis 2 do not show the weekly Sabbath was created on day 7 of Creation Week nor that all men were bound to it. So, if they do not say this separately, they cannot be evidence for one another. All that Mark 2 says is that it was created. And Matthew says nothing about it at all.

Taken together, does the evidence show Jesus declaring the Sabbath binding into the New Covenant? No. That large of a claim is not supported in the text.
Nothing about this conversation was particularly about the New Covenant. The same reasoning intended to bring the Sabbath into the New Covenant accidentally brings every law, and ultimately prevents the New Covenant in the first place. We know that is not what happened.

The Sabbatarian position does not come from a straight reading or a study of the underlying Greek. It comes from predetermined conclusions and is being read into Mark. This position requires critical details to be assumed into the narrative in a rather circular fashion.

What was the definition of eisegesis again? Oh yes, "the process of interpreting a text by imposing one's own presuppositions, agendas, or biases into it, rather than drawing meaning from the text itself."

I find it ironic that the Sabbatarian position ends up siding closer with the Pharisees than with Jesus.

Saturday, June 20, 2026

The Law Is Written On Our Hearts - Part II

God promised to write the law on our hearts. Does that mean we will all keep the Old Covenant law? The whole law? If that is so, then why do we see something very different being practiced? Does modern Sabbatarianism hold the correct solution to this prophecy?

We are looking into the prophecies of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, where the law is written on our hearts. In the previous post, we walked through the more legalist approach taken in some modern, mainly Sabbatarian, church groups. We found there are many private interpretations of what "the law" means, and all are but a fraction of the whole law. These lists do not resemble what Ezekiel and Jeremiah would recognize as the law. So we ask, do several competing partial lists, hand picked and edited, that change over time, really solve the issue and fulfill the prophecy?

Today, we will investigate the second opinion. As a refresher, that was:
Opinion 2) The Old Covenant law is gone but the spirit of the law remains, the whole law is fulfilled in faith and love, and the Holy Spirit leads us in it.

Let's just be fair here - mainstream Christianity sounds just as absurd to a Sabbatarian as Sabbatarianism does to a mainstream Christian. What started Sabbatarianism in the first place? In Catholicism, the Ten Commandments are required, but not really the fourth. Protestants continued this, but then started asking, "Why not the fourth Commandment?" voilà! Sabbatarianism. The whole thing was started by competing lists. Are there no competing ideas in mainstream Christianity like there are in Sabbatarianism? With 40,000+ denominations in the world, undeniably, there are. We traded one Pope for a billion Popes.

Whatever I said about the Sabbatarians in the last post, you can pretty much say the same thing about most mainstream Christianity. The field is ripe for "so's your old man" logical fallacies.

So, what on earth is the answer to this puzzle??

With issues like this, it is wise to start at the start. Let's start with the most fundamental thing I can think of.

LEGALLY DONE

If even so much as one law is removed, any whatsoever, then we need to ask HOW was that law removed in the first place. This needs to be answered because if you believe Jesus is who He said He is, then this affects you. This isn't an opinion 1 vs opinion 2 thing. It's all of us.

I often see people mention, "I looked but don't see where [insert law here] was removed. Where was it removed?" A valid question. Many can see in Hebrews where the priesthood had changed. But what about other laws, like the prohibition against mixed fabrics? How are they removed? Before Christ, there was the Levitical Priesthood. After Christ, there was not. What happened? The Bible doesn't say? No, it does say. It says: the Christ event.

But saying "the Christ event" isn't good enough for this. It's too broad. We need to know what about the Christ event, specifically.

Let's get one thing absolutely straight. Jesus did not simply abolish the law by decree. If you go looking for, "I, Jesus of Nazareth, hereby declare Tzitzit removed," you're not going to find that. He did not do it one law at a time. There was no, "This law stays, this law goes, this group stays, this group goes." This is the place where Matthew 5:17-18 comes in.

Instead, Jesus Christ - the very One who made the Covenant with Israel at Sinai (1 Cor. 10:4; Jude 5) - did something far more profound: First He kept the covenant blamelessly, to fulfill Israel's end of the deal, then He died and rose again.
This is the important part of the Christ event we must zoom in on -- when He died, that Old Covenant dissolved completely. Nothing could change until everything changed.

Gone. Abolished. Abrogated. Passed away. In Part I, I quoted a person who said, "What is dissolved, abolished, decays, grows old, fades away was the sacrificial system." Negative. Not the ceremonial law only. It was the entire Covenant.

Find, if you can, even one passage where the New Testament explains the change in the law by any other means than the replacing of the Old Covenant. You won't find one. (And no, I do not think Mark 17: 9 counts.)
You can repeat "only the ceremonial law is gone" all you like. The burden of proof is on you to demonstrate how that is possible. The New Testament never portrays God as editing the Sinai Covenant line by line. It consistently explains the change by pointing to the end of the Old Covenant and the arrival of the New. Even in Hebrews 8! And when did that happen? At His death. When did the curtain tear in half? People think only the ceremonial law is gone because that is what they see in Hebrews 7-8, but how does Hebrews explain the means for removing the ceremonial law? By removal of the entire covenant! Was the Covenant merely the priesthood (DEU. 4:13)? No.

The question now changes from, "how was the law removed?" to, "how can any law survive this?"

Once the contract ends, all the terms end. The answer is clear: No Old Covenant law survived.

Sabbatarianism simply declares, "All laws survive unless otherwise stated." But how is that possible? Name one contract that works this way. Do you have any idea how many laws were never 'otherwise stated', which means they survive? See part I for those numbers.

Once agreed to, a contract cannot be changed (GAL. 3:15). Yet, things have changed. They have, or else Jesus Christ is not your High Priest, the Jews and Gentiles are not one, those laws that your list doesn't include are still required, there is no Spiritual Israel, and all Gentiles are not heirs but still strangers. These are not merely ceremonial points. Since things have changed, then we know the contract changed.

There are three options for altering a contract.

You may sign a new contract that amends but does not replace the first. The New Covenant is not the New Addendum. If it were, this would need to be clearly stated somewhere. It isn't.
You may agree to a new contract that replaces the first. The New Covenant has replaced the Old entirely. New terms, new promises, new parties. The Old is dead. This is clearly stated in the New Testament (HEB. 8:6-7, 13; II. COR. 3:7; GAL. 4:21-31).
You may naturally terminate the contract. This is also clearly stated. Death naturally terminates a contract. In Romans 6:1-4 & 7:1-6, and Galatians 2:19-20, and elsewhere, Paul tells us we have died in Christ. In dying with Christ, we are freed from the covenant.

We have not just one escape but two.

None of this was done by simply declaring it so. All was done legally. Meticulously. Properly.
(For more, read "Confusing the Covenants".)

This is how any law at all was removed. But not just one law; the whole covenant! No Old Covenant law survives this. This shifts things from, "where does it say that law was removed," to, "where does it say that law is part of the New Covenant." And the weekly Sabbath was never said to be reintroduced in the New Covenant.

The same selection from Jeremiah which promises a law written on hearts also promises a New Covenant which is not like the Old. And that is exactly how the author of Hebrews treats it. No New Testament author appeals to Jeremiah 31 to justify law observance or to claim, "Nothing's different. Carry on as usual."

With the exception of some outliers, both opinions 1 and 2 believe the Old Covenant is gone. Both opinions must wrestle with this same problem. The Covenant cannot be gone and not gone at the same time. It cannot be 100% replaced and only 5/6 replaced at the same time.

Now, I bet you are wondering how a law can be gone and written on our hearts at the same time.

THE SOLUTION

To say, "the letter of the law must be written on our hearts," is to say, "the ceremonial law including the Levitical Priesthood must be written on our hearts." They were laws, were they not? That is completely inconsistent with the belief that the letter of the law is written on our hearts but those particular laws are gone. (We touched on this in the last post) The answer is not in customized short-lists of laws, with some moral laws here and some ceremonial laws there; fulfilling a small fraction of the law but never all of it, yet claiming that's all of it. Where do Jeremiah and Ezekiel say, "some of the law"?

So, what is the solution?

I will put it to you bluntly and openly: the letter of the law is not written on our hearts; the spirit of the law is (ROM. 2:29; 7:6; II COR. 3:4-6).

Every New Testament author follows a singular theme. I will sum up the solution like this: fulfill all of the law through love and faith.

We've heard a great deal about this verse:

(MAT. 5:17) Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.

Very popular proof text. Frequently used. Top ten. Jesus was not going to solve this by simply tossing out laws (in other words, following opinion 1). He was going to keep Israel's end of the bargain. Yet, I find it odd that no one seems to quote the follow-up:

(MAT. 7:12) Therefore, whatever you want men to do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

From the Golden Rule to the greatest laws.

(MAT. 22: 37-40) 37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

All the law and all the prophets. It is all summed up in two words: faith and love.

(JON. 13:34-35) 34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

(JON. 15:12-14,17) 12 This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. 14 You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. ... 17 These things I command you, that you love one another.

It's what John said: I John. 3:11,23 and II John 1:6.
It's what Peter said: I Peter 4:8.
It's what Paul said: Galatians 5:14 and I Timothy. 1:5.
It's what James said: James 2:8.
It's what Jude said: Jude 20-21.

If you love, then you fulfill the whole law. All of it. And the Prophets, too. That is how the whole law is kept even when the letter of the law is gone. Paul calls it "the spirit of the law" (ROM. 7: 6). The intent. The real point.
The real point of tefillin was not to hang scripture on your forehead (DEU. 11:18).
The real point of circumcision was not to cut off your skin (ROM. 2: 9).
Seriously, Paul bluntly says you don't need the law to keep the spirit of the law (ROM. 2:14).

Find for me where the New Testament emphasizes the Sabbath in this way as it does faith and love. I'll save you the time, it doesn't. But love and faith are repeatedly offered as the solution.

Some will immediately think of Hebrews 4:9: "There remains therefore a rest for the people of God." But the context of Hebrews 4 is not that the promised rest is found in the weekly Sabbath. It literally says the opposite! Rather, the chapter repeatedly points to a rest entered into by faith in Christ. I've discussed that passage in more detail elsewhere. For now, it is enough to note that even here the emphasis falls on faith, not on preserving an Old Covenant ordinance.

One will no doubt say to me, "But 'love your neighbor' is straight from the law. The two great commandments were in the law." Yes, they were. But we do not love simply because Moses commanded it, and we would not stop loving simply because a covenant ended. The Bible never says, "Keep the law and you will fulfill love." It says the opposite: love fulfills the law.
That was Jesus' point, was it not? The law pointed to something greater than itself. Before Sinai there was God, and before there was any written code there was love, because God's very nature is love. Love and faith go straight to the ultimate source.
The Old Covenant did not create love and faith; it bore witness to it. The two great commandments are equally as valid in the New Covenant as they were in the Old not because they "came forward" but because love is a deep, eternal truth and faith is mandatory. That is why so many New Testament writers can say that love fulfills the law.

Can you say the same about tithes? No. Does avoiding shrimp cocktail fulfill the law? No. The Sabbath law doesn't even say "go to church on Saturday", so how can that fulfill anything at all?

If you have one law - no, let's say you have the entire category of moral law - then what do you have? Not the whole law. That's for certain. And as the law itself will attest, if we approach this by law but do not have the whole law, then we have nothing at all. But if we approach this by the spirit of the law - love and faith - then what does the New Testament consistently say we have? All the law and the prophets.

It's the only way.

(JON. 4:23-24) 23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

Finally, let's take a look at that new heart.

ABOUT THAT NEW HEART

I will give you a new heart.

What is a heart? Not your beating heart, but your emotional and inner self. What goes into and out from a heart? Is it not faith and love (I TIM. 1:5; I PET. 1:22)? And what did Ezekiel say about the heart?

(EZE 36: 26-27) 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

What is a heart of stone? What is a heart of flesh? Is stone not about stubbornness and pride? Is flesh not about teachableness and humility?

So, we must ask, what does a new heart do for the old law? If this new heart is so capable of keeping the old law, then why do all lists only have at most 5/6 of the laws on them? And why is it that, even when 5/6 is all there is left, people still fail at it? Because that isn't the solution. It cheats. What is the new heart is capable of? Love. And what is love? All the law and all the prophets.

I know someone will say to me, "But I do have faith. We have to have faith and keep the law, too."

And to that I ask, have you heard nothing I've said? You don't keep the letter of the law. "Keeping" 1/6 of the law is not "keeping the law". But if you have faith and love, then you already have the whole law. I personally believe this to be true - that you will find you accidentally fulfill more of the law through your love and faith than you realize, and far more than you literally accomplish through "keeping" a customized set of laws.

(ROM. 3:31) Do we then make void the law through faith? Certainly not! On the contrary, we establish the law.

If even after all this you still want to keep some of the law, then I say do it. The Jewish converts kept the law, zealously. Observing a Sabbath isn't the problem. The problem is thinking it earns you anything with God, and that this partial law-keeping makes you superior to others who don't believe they have to follow along.

CONCLUSION

Even as some say, "The law is the same," they also say, "Most of the law is gone." Even as some say, "The law has not changed," they also say, "The law has changed significantly." Even as some say, "the ceremonial laws are gone," they retain some ceremonial laws and call them "moral". Not because they are moral, but because they made it onto the list. Laws are retained, laws are removed, laws are changed, and new laws are invented. To me, this is cheating.

What is the solution, then?

Jesus is the law-keeper.
Jesus is our righteousness.
His righteousness comes to us by faith alone.
Our laws are faith and love.
Faith and love fulfill the intent of the entire law and the prophets.
The Holy Spirit is sent to be our guide.
If we are following the Holy Spirit, we will not be doing lawless things.

Faith and love and the in-dwelling of the Holy Spirit - THAT is the solution. That is the law written on our hearts. That is us keeping His statues and judgments. Whatever you think is required above and beyond that is just window dressing.

(I COR. 13:13) And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Where is "law" in that list? Absent. Why? Because if you have faith and love then you've fulfilled the whole law. Hebrews 11 isn't the "law chapter". This is what Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Isaiah were talking about. This is what all the Apostles were talking about. This is what Jesus was talking about.

We started with two options:
Opinion 1) The Old Covenant law remains, but only some of it, and the Holy Spirit helps us keep it.
Opinion 2) The Old Covenant law is gone, but the spirit of the law remains, the whole law is fulfilled in faith and love, and the Holy Spirit leads us in it.

As for me, I'm going with Opinion 2.

For more, I suggest:

The Law (The Ten Commandments)
The Sabbath Rest of John 14
Is Ceremonial Law Removed?
Are the Ten Commandments Removed?
Confusing the Covenants
Why Not Keep Biblical Days?
Tithing - You're Doing It Wrong
Lawlessness and I John 3
Common Legalist Arguments - part 1
What Use Is The Old Law?
Old Covenant vs. New Covenant
The Road To Sabbatarianism - Part I
Paul's Use of Psalm 32 In Romans 4

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Acts 17:11

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Saturday, June 13, 2026

The Law Is Written On Our Hearts - Part I

(JER. 31: 33) But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

(EZE. 36: 26-27) 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

God said He would write the law on Israel's hearts and cause them to keep it. So, the natural question is - what does that mean? Some say it can only mean we must keep the Old Covenant law and go to church on Saturday. They say, "The issue of the New Covenant is not the removal of God's law but its internalization," and, "The New Covenant promise is not that God's law would be discarded." Others disagree. They say the Old Covenant is gone. But how can those who disagree claim the law is removed when it is supposed to be written on hearts and kept?
It's a reasonable question. We need to find a reasonable answer.

We basically have two options:
Opinion 1) The Old Covenant law remains, but only some of it, and the Holy Spirit helps us keep it.
Opinion 2) The Old Covenant law is gone, but the spirit of the law remains, the whole law is fulfilled in faith and love, and the Holy Spirit leads us in it.

Clearly, they cannot both be correct. Which of these is the New Covenant way?

I am not going to get deep in scripture and such today. I want to start by digging in to opinion #1 so we can see clearly how opinion #1 actually works. I think this is important.

THE WHOLE LAW?

First things first, we have to deal with a genuine problem affecting opinion 1: of all those who say the law is written on our hearts, practically no one thinks the whole law remains as written.

So many people make claims like, "The new covenant is still the same God's laws, only that they are written upon the tables of hearts of the true believers." That is a direct quote, copied and pasted. But is it correct? For all the times I see this kind of comment, I have yet to see anyone who really believes the law in the New Covenant is the same as the Old. Nevertheless, I see this kind of comment frequently.

If you are going to base your entire religious outlook on the claim that the law is eternal, from Genesis to Revelation, then you might want to consider living by that claim. No one does.

I've asked many people if they keep all 613 laws, and the very first thing they do is start to explain how that isn't required.
There is one good point to mention. Some said to me, "Even Jesus didn't keep all 613. How could He keep the laws about the Kohanim and Levites?"
Believe it or not, I think this is a fair point. Let's grant it. Not even Jesus kept all 613 because not all 613 applied to every Jewish person. Quite true! But...
That does nothing to change the fact that the whole law was there. And if the law is the same, as is frequently claimed, then those laws are still there.

But more importantly for us now, all the whole law was in place when Jeremiah and Ezekiel wrote what they did. To the Prophets, "the law" is the whole body of law. But to modern Sabbatarians, that is not what "the law" means.

My usual response to this "we don't have to keep all 613 laws" point is to ask, "So, how many would you say you do keep, then?"
I have yet to get a response to this question.

What happened to "do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets" and "not one jot or one tittle" (MAT. 5: 17-18)? What happened to Romans 3: 31? What happened to all the other proof texts and common legalist arguments that I've quoted and that have been quoted to me in order to claim the law is still in effect? Gone.
In my last post, "Lawlessness and I John 3" we discussed how the Pharisees are accused of lawlessness for adding to the law, which takes away from the law. Here, people literally take away from the law, and they call that "keeping the law". How?

In other words, one thing is being said and another thing entirely is meant. It's a bait and switch.
I was specifically told, "The New Covenant promise is not that God's law would be discarded." No? Then why is that exactly what I see happening? And they do this even as they say, "God's law is eternal" (is it?) - and sing "O How Love I Thy Law" (do you?).

The exact number 613 was never the point. It merely helps to show how "the law" is not the same today as it was. The laws being "kept" are not the ones Jeremiah and Ezekiel knew. Far from it.

Vast swaths of law have been removed. Barely 3% remains. How can this be "the law"?

BITE-SIZED PORTIONS

So, "the law" is not the whole law. Then what is it? The definition changes from group to group. In some cases, it's the Ten Commandments only. Others add tithes and sometimes meats laws. Still others add holy days. Herbert Armstrong had his preaching credentials revoked by the COG7 for teaching more law than they thought was necessary. No two Sabbatarian groups seem to agree. This is no small thing!

Yet, they all have separated the law into three chunks: moral, ceremonial, and national. Not because the Bible makes these categories, mind you. It does not; they are entirely theological. Then, they've tossed out 2 of those categories: ceremonial and national. Gone. Right off the top. But to divide them up and toss some out actually violates the law. Is DEU. 4:2 written on our hearts, too?

This was said to me just the other day:

"The law is the terms of both Covenants. What is dissolved, abolished, decays, grows old, fades away was the sacrificial system. The Levitical laws of the priesthood, animal sacrifices, because the Messiah replaced them once and for all. These works where to fade away, become the old part of the agreement, giving way to the New."

I want you to notice, one cannot say "the law is the terms of both Covenants" as they are explaining how 1/3 of the law is not the terms of both covenants.

I am confident that person did not mean to say the national laws remain, even if that is how that comment reads. What they meant was, "The law is the terms of both covenants. 2/3 of the law are not the terms of both covenants."

The two big challenges here are:
1) Can one claim they are "keeping the law" when they reject 2/3 of the law?
2) How did two categories of the law dissolve with the Covenant, but one survive?

Sabbatarians ask me, "Why would God create a law just to get rid of it?" And I ask them, "So, you keep the ceremonial law, then?" And they say to me, "The ceremonial and national law was removed and no longer apply." Then I ask them, "Why would God create a law just to get rid of it?"
(There is an answer to that, by the way. It isn't arbitrary. I talk about it in other articles.)

But here is an interesting thing to ponder - just because theologians have divided the laws up into three groups does not mean they are equally 1/3 each. Since the Bible did not create these groups, they are open to interpretation and there is no official number. But the rough guesstimate is: Ceremonial=250-350, National=200-300, Moral=50-100. Do you see how much smaller the moral category is than the other two? It isn't 2/3 of the law that is gone, it's more like 5/6. A mere 1/6 of the law is "the law".

The claim is, since the laws are moral then they must remain. But where does the Bible say that? Is it law that creates morality? Is God moral because He keeps laws? I can't even get a straight answer on what "moral law" means. Which ones are the moral laws, exactly? I ask around, but I always get answers crafted to come to the conclusion that "moral" means "the laws we need to keep". So, we need to keep the moral law and the moral law are the ones we need to keep? Nothing circular there.

And let's not forget the definition changes over time. These groups tend to claim they are the original "one true church", which survived in hidden enclaves in the French Alps or somewhere. But when we read through history, including the histories written by these very churches, none of those earlier "true church eras" kept the same list as the next. How does that work?

And this is where the conversation usually devolves into ad hominem and straw men. "You're opposing Almighty God!" No. I'm searching for the truth, and God is truth. "God is going to make a third death just for you" Perhaps I would deserve it, but not for this. "Are you saying it's OK to murder and commit adultery??" No. As if the world outside their church is entirely populated by nothing other than rapists and murderers.
I am not justifying immorality. I am merely searching for straight answers.

Therefore, I propose there are really four categories: moral, ceremonial, national, and "the ones I want other people to keep".

But dividing up the law and tossing most of it is not end of the matter. Next, the law must endure a heavy editing process.

EDITING THE LAW

So, "the law" really means "moral law". This sounds great at first. But even that is not really what's going on.

A law isn't required because it is moral, but called "moral" because it is required (by themselves).

Don't understand the difference? Let's walk through this together.

Each group has their own set of laws which they require. Each group claims their list are the "moral laws". Remember - this includes such things as annual holy days, tithes, and meats laws. Things that are clearly not moral.

The weekly Sabbath is only called moral because it is one of the Ten Commandments and the rest of the Ten are moral laws. It is moral by association. It isn't called moral for its own qualities but because it must be moral or else it's hard to get it onto the list. But let's just say for sake of argument that it does have some kind of moral component in there. That does nothing for the annual sabbaths (holy days). They are not in the Ten. No moral by association here. So, how are they on the list? And what of meats laws? One cannot say certain animals were morally unclean. And what of tithes? Tithes are not moral in any way. Ten is not the moral percentage, whereas nine is ceremonial and eleven national. One could say charity is moral, but tithes were not charity. They were required, like taxes, and went to the Levites, who are gone. How is tithing on the list?

So, a law is not required because it has a purely moral component. Rather, a law is called "moral" because it has made it onto their particular short list.

Days and tithes and foods are by nature ceremonial, not moral. But these ceremonial laws are on the list for some groups, and therefore they are re-christened as "moral law". The law is artificially divided into categories, then the definitions of the categories are manipulated.

But it's more than that. It is not just the categories that are manipulated but the individual laws themselves. Laws are taken away from and added to on an individual basis.

How so? Let's start with taking away from the law.

Tithing is mandatory, but the tithe is done incorrectly. Tithing was never 10% (it was 1-in-10; there's a difference), it was never on cash money (it was on harvest and flock), it doesn't go to Levites as the law demands (that was its primary reason for tithes to exist), the second tithe is used for one holy day only rather than three (Tabernacles), and most abandon the third tithe completely. If tithing law is so moral, then why not follow the tithing law?

Some groups say the holy days are mandatory, but none of the laws on how to keep the holy days are mandatory. For example, most groups which claim Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles are mandatory do not go to Jerusalem to keep them as is required. Most have never built a booth in their lives. The Feast of Firstfruits is ignored almost completely. Few blow a shofar on Trumpets. And let's not even begin to describe Atonement.

And what of new moons? Psalm 81:3 and Hosea 2:11 do appear to call the new moon a feast day. Amos 8:5 practically treats it like a sabbath. And I Samuel 20 shows it being observed. Do a word search. "New moon" and "Sabbath" and "appointed feast" appear together far more often than not. Ignored completely.

One of the biggest steps on my journey out of Armstrongism was when I asked a close friend why the law says one thing about holy days but we do another, and he responded, "Herbert Armstrong changed the law out of necessity."
OUT OF NECESSITY???
So, we get to just edit the law to make it easier to keep because it's too challenging as written and we still get to claim we're "keeping the law"? If it's that simple, what did the Pharisees do that was so bad?

So, even if a law is on the list and is called "moral", the detailed rules on how to observe that law are ignored. How can a thing be moral when the instructions on how to observe that thing are not moral?
As I used to say quite often, "The law! The law! ... just not THAT law."

Now, let's move on to adding to the law.

We've discussed in the past how the Sabbath is not about when you go to church. The Fourth Commandment doesn't say to "go to church". Jesus went to synagogue ...but only because that was the tradition of the Pharisees. It wasn't a law. No law in the entire Bible says to "go to church" (or synagogue). That is added onto the law. Yet this addition is, to Sabbatarians, the single most important thing in all of the law, bar none. Their identity. Their raison d'être.

Armstrongism has manufactured an entire annual day called "Night To Be Much Remembered" or "Night To Be Much Observed". This day comes from a misreading of Exodus 12: 42. When read properly, it turns out Passover is the night to be observed. A whole day is added while other days are ignored.

I could go on and on like this. Have you ever read the details of what Ellen G White did to the law with all her additions and clarifications? Individual laws added to and taken away from, same as what the Pharisees did. And all this while they teach the law is required as written, unchanged, and they're the best at it.

It's cheating.

CONCLUSION

Contrary to what it may appear, my point in this article is not to point fingers and accuse. This article is only meant to show how the Sabbatarian solution to "the law is written on our hearts" is far less straightforward than it first appears. Jeremiah says "the law". Sabbatarians say "the law". But are we talking about the same thing? No.

We need to be mindful of what is really going on. It's important. Because the question before us is: is opinion 1 really the solution?
How can it be?

Despite all the people who claim the fulfillment of the prophecy is in observing the law, good luck finding one who believes it is the law as Jeremiah and Ezekiel knew it.
When the appeal turns to verses like Genesis 7:1 and 26:5 in an attempt to demonstrate the law is eternal, we have to ask, is it? When the appeal turns to Isaiah 66 in an attempt to demonstrate a law in the future is a law today, we have to ask, is it? Because when we look around, we see the whole law is given lip service but it is not being practiced or even required. Instead, "the law" has become several competing abbreviated and edited lists, constructed on proof-texts, designed to uphold predetermined conclusions, with each group convinced that its own list remains in force while other competing lists, although only slightly different, are entirely wrong. Does keeping a custom list of laws fulfill the prophecy?

Whatever Jeremiah does mean, I cannot agree it is this.

Jeremiah said God would write His law on the heart. He did! The question is what God has in mind by "the law." And if He did not mean a selectively edited remnant of the Old Covenant, then what exactly did he mean?
We will discuss that in the next post.

For more, I suggest:

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Acts 17:11

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Tuesday, June 2, 2026

Lawlessness and I John 3

You may have heard, "Sin is the transgression of the law." A favorite Sabbatarian proof-text. You may have also heard "lawlessness" means being without the Old Covenant law". If so, the Pharisees should have been the least lawless people in Israel. Yet Jesus accused them of lawlessness. There is more to lawlessness than the law.

In my last post, "The Sabbath Rest of John 14", I wrote about how "keep My commandments" did not refer to the Ten Commandments. We learned what "commandments" means. Today, I want to discuss another proof text for law-keeping: I John 3: 4. Let's see what "lawlessness" means.

Picture saying "sin is transgression of the law"

The Bible was not written in KJV English

When I was a Sabbatarian, I took the word "lawlessness" to mean "being without the law". The Old Covenant law, that is. I mean, just look at the word: law-less. Even the Greek word anomos (ἄνομος) literally translates to "without law". Can it get plainer than that? Mainstream Christians claim they are under grace rather than law, but isn't that the very definition of 'lawlessness' which Jesus and the Apostles spoke out against?

I understand how easy it is to come to this conclusion, but the conclusion is not built on a careful examination of the concept of lawlessness. It's built on what I just said, the word itself. Granted it is an obvious conclusion, but is it the right conclusion? For example, are you reckless only when you don't have any reck?

If anyone was ever in favor of the Old Covenant law, it was the Pharisees. If we are going to take this word on face value, then Jesus accused the most law-oriented people in Israel of being the ones who possessed the least law.
They had the full law yet did not have the law? How does that work?

This is not lost on Sabbatarians. We simply concluded they had too much law. The Pharisees added to it, and that was just as bad as taking away from it (DEU. 4: 2).
But doesn't having too much law break the definition of "being without the law"? Too much law is the opposite of no law.

As a Sabbatarian, I would have responded that the Pharisees were nullifying the law with their traditions (MAT. 15: 6). They were using traditions and interpretations to remove God's intent for the law. They were spiritually lawless.

Ah! Now we're getting somewhere. Do you see how the argument is subtly moving away from "without Torah" towards something much deeper?

My point in this back and forth is to demonstrate that even those who define lawlessness as 'not having the Old Covenant law' know it is not so simple.

How does this all tie together? What is lawlessness? How can those who are the most focused on the law be lawless? Is sin defined as breaking the Old Covenant law? What does any of this have to do with Christians in the New Covenant? And are grace-based Christians guilty of the same offense as the Pharisees?

Today's article is going to rely on you having read the Road to Sabbatarianism series. If you read that series, you will be much better prepared to understand some concepts in this article.

Let's start with the prime proof-text of this view.

KJV ONLY

In Sabbatarian theology, few verses are more foundational than this one:

(I JON. 3: 4) [KJV] Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.

Not just this verse, but the King James Version rendering of this verse, specifically. The conclusion we are supposed to reach is, "If the definition of sin is to violate the law, then don't violate the law!" It overrides practically any discussion on how Covenants work.

But here's the thing - that's not what the verse actually says.

hē [the] hamartia [sin] estin [is] hē [the] anomia [lawlessness]

Sin is lawlessness.

Don't understand the difference? Let's walk through this together.

The KJV translators rendered the single Greek word anomia (ἀνομία) as “transgression of the law.” But “transgression of the law” is not in the Greek text. Perhaps you could translate anomia simply as “transgression” or “lawlessness,” but not both.
“Transgression of the law” worked reasonably well 500 years ago, when English usage was broader and less technical than it is today. But in modern English, the phrase sounds far more specific and legalistic than the Greek word anomia supports.

The translators of the NKJV tried to preserve the language and feel of the KJV wherever possible. Their decision to render anomia as ‘lawlessness’ here instead of ‘transgression of the law’ is telling.

With that correction in wording should come a correction in understanding. I propose John is not defining sin as literally "lacking the Old Covenant law". Rather, he is using anomia to reveal what sin is at heart (pun intended). John is adding gravity to sin.

In order to understand why John thinks lawlessness is such a terrible thing to be accused of, we need to understand what lawlessness meant to him in the first place. Let's see some examples of how the underlying Greek words were used in the Apostles' time and place.

SEPTUAGINT AND BEYOND

I don’t want to get buried in a lesson on the Greek language. Just know there are several words in play here, such as anomos (lawless; adjective), anomia (lawlessness; noun), and anomōs (lawlessly; adverb) along with their various forms. These are a family of words built around the same basic idea.

This word family appears several times in the the Septuagint; the Greek Old Testament. We know the Apostles read the Septuagint because they often quote it. Let's see a few examples.

(PSA. 32: 1) Blessed are they whose transgressions [anomiai] are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.

(PSA. 51: 2) Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity [anomias], and cleanse me from my sin.

(ISA. 53: 5) But he was wounded on account of our transgressions, and was bruised because of our iniquities [anomiai]: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; by his bruises we were healed.

Clearly, these do not indicate Old Covenant law was missing. Was King David without Torah? Was Messiah bruised because no one had Torah? How can "being without Torah" be plural? "Being without Torahs"?

If you scan every instance of this word family in the Septuagint, then check how translators render those into English, you get a list with words like: iniquity, transgression, wickedness, unrighteousness, lawlessness. The idea isn't an absence or imbalance in Old Covenant law, but moral corruption and rebellion against God.

But the Septuagint wasn't the only Greek resource we can check. When we investigate how these words were used in the Qumran community (think Dead Sea Scrolls), or by Josephus, or in the wider Greek world, we find such things as: violation of social order, covenant betrayal, impurity, wickedness, disorder, spiritual corruption, opposition to God's will, rebellion.

To put that into an easy-to-digest visual:

Septuagint (moral) → transgression, iniquity, wickedness, rebellion

Qumran (covenantal) → covenant betrayal, impurity, corruption, rebellion

Josephus (historical/political) → wickedness, disorder, rebellion

Wider Greek usage (social/civic) → disorder, social chaos, impiety, rebellion

This shows us what a broad range of meanings these words had. The idea is nowhere near as simple as "without law" let alone "without Old Covenant law".

Now, notice something strange in Matthew:

(MAT. 7: 23) And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness (anomia)!’

A popular verse. You've probably read it a thousand times. But, practice lawlessness? How odd. Jesus says much the same in MAT. 13:41. Which definition of lawlessness makes more sense here?
A) Practice "without the law"
or
B) practice [the words listed above]

I'm going with B!

Consider how odd it is to accuse someone of actively doing "without the law". As if "without the law" is something you can do. Using a noun like an action is not unusual. People "commit murder" or "show mercy". But how does one commit "no law"? It's like saying, "I'm going to insufficient funds tonight." It makes no sense.

But practicing wickedness or corruption or iniquity makes complete sense.

Given this, it is not advisable to jump to the conclusion that "lawlessness" means "being without the Old Covenant law." Taking the word at face value actually misses the point.

Let's compare these two very different definitions of lawless to see which works better for the Pharisees.

ALLIES IN OPEN REBELLION

Jesus did not accuse everyone of lawlessness. Jesus criticized the Sadducees sure enough, but He never directly accused them of lawlessness. Strangely, He never directly accused the Romans of lawlessness. They seem to be the most deserving.

What was Jesus accusing the Pharisees of, then? Consider the definitions in the previous section. They were rebellious.

Hypocritical. Vain. Argumentative. Accusers. Political. Scheming. Entrapping. Fastidious about the law, but completely missing the point. Claiming they were God's people, but could not recognize Him. Using the law as a weapon to set themselves up and to beat others down.

Lawlessness is things like this. ↑↑↑↑

When Jesus accused the Pharisees of lawlessness, He did not single out the law as the problem, and He didn't offer them the law as the solution. See for yourself:

(MAT. 23: 28) Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

How can one be filled with "without law"? It's even more absurd than saying they were doing "without law".
But did you miss the part of how they appeared righteous? On the outside they were keeping the law. Paul felt Pharisees kept the law. He described it in Philippians 3, "a Hebrew of the Hebrews; concerning the law, a Pharisee" [v5] ... "concerning the righteousness which is in the law, blameless" [v6]. But many times he goes on to describe his own failures. So, they were not "without the law".
Others thought the Pharisees were righteous, because they were keeping the law. The lawlessness was inside ...of their hearts. God knew.

(MAT. 15: 8) These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me.

I think we've fairly well established the meaning of lawlessness. Now, let's circle back again to I John 3.

LAWLESS AT HEART

(I JON. 3: 4) [NKJV] Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness.

Notice John says “also”: “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness.” They are separate in concept, but inseparable in practice. All sin falls under the umbrella of lawlessness. Lawlessness is all those terrible things we saw above, and sin is a manifestation of it. What I am driving at here is: sin is a symptom of something wrong inside. Something that law-keeping in and of itself cannot fix.
Did John write this to a Christian in order to emphasize the law? No. He did it to emphasize the gravity of sin!

So, we have to ask, is being 'under grace not law' the very definition of 'lawlessness' which Jesus and the Apostles spoke out against? No.

But it can be! ...if we don't take sin seriously.

We are in danger of developing the attitude that since we are under grace we can behave any way we wish and we'll just be forgiven. There are moral requirements in Christianity. In the age of grace, sin is still sinful. In the age of the New Covenant, covenant betrayal is still possible. As a good friend of mine said, "Sin is acting like you don't have any obligation to anybody but your own needs and wants." Jesus didn't only come to save you, He came so He could send the Holy Spirit to transform you. John's point is much the same message as Paul's from Romans 6. Discipleship means to become like the Teacher. If you're not becoming like the Teacher, then what are you doing?

So, what of the law? I know someone out there is still thinking the law is the medicine for sin. It's not. The Holy Spirit is.

In "The Road to Sabbatarianism - part III", we saw how both sin and righteousness can exist apart from the law. Sin is any violation of God's nature. The law was neither the ultimate source of nor the solution for sin. All of those first-century Jews who rejected their Messiah had the Mosaic law. How'd that go?
The Pharisees had the law, and everyone thought they were righteous (except the One who knows the heart). This tells us the law can either reveal the issue or it can be used to mask the issue. Because law-keeping relies on the heart, one thing it cannot do is remove the issue. If it could, then Jesus died in vain (GAL. 2: 21).
In the New Covenant, sin is not about the Old Covenant law. New covenant, new terms. And the righteousness God wants does not come from law-keeping, but from His own righteousness being credited to us by faith.
None of this is about the old law. John never wrote "sin is the transgression of the law". The word "lawlessness" is not about the Torah. It certainly isn't about trying to find the proper balance of Torah. All of this is about the heart. It's about God and our relationship with Him.

John 3:4 may not point to the Old Covenant law, but John also does not leave us with the idea that grace means having no rules whatsoever.

(I JON. 3: 23) And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.

As we saw in "The Sabbath Rest of John 14", John's antidote to sin and lawlessness is a life defined by faith and love. If you are following the Holy Spirit, would you be lawless?

CONCLUSION

Does the Bible define sin as "the transgression of the law"? No. John never wrote that.
Remember, the meme at the start of this article says, 'It's not what you think sin is, it's what does scripture say sin is.' Well, scripture doesn't say that.
John wrote, “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness. Sin is lawlessness”

Lawlessness is not best understood as 'being without the Old Covenant law', or 'being with too much Old Covenant law', or even 'not Sabbathing properly'. That is not what it meant in the original Greek. If it were, then Sabbatarians - who only keep about 2-3% of the law - are far more lawless than the Pharisees.
The obvious reading is misleading.

As the back and forth at the start of this post shows, even those who redefine lawlessness as "lacking Torah" eventually run into this same conclusion that I am making now - there is much more to lawlessness than meets the eye.
It isn't that one is literally without laws, but that one is figuratively without them. Spiritually without controls and boundaries. That's why you can have the law yet still be lawless (and not just the Pharisees, because we see "lawlessness" throughout the Old Testament). Lawlessness is a problem of the heart. It is about betraying the Covenant that you are in. It is a rebellion against the God we claim to follow. In effect, it is a rejection of Him.

It is lovelessness, faithlessness, hypocrisy, injustice, symbol over substance, and corruption hiding beneath outward religiosity.

It is going through the motions. It is being spiritually off course without correcting it. It's comparing ourselves to others and pointing the finger at them. It is accusing our neighbor rather than helping them. It is mouthing Jesus is your Lord, yet behaving like anything but. It is a mask of righteousness. It is claiming you keep the law when you you've missed the point. If even Satan himself can appear as an angel of light, then we humans can use law and grace to lie about our spiritual condition, too.

That is why lawlessness is such a serious accusation. John was not putting us all under the law. Rather, John was packing all the terrible meanings above into one word (lawlessness) and applying it to sin to expose what sin really is. And sin is but a symptom, a symptom of this internal problem.

The law cannot fix this. Never could. Law can only expose it ...or hide it.

I have always admired the way Armstrongism recognized there is more to the Christian walk than merely "being forgiven". There is a genuine emphasis on personal responsibility and the danger of becoming spiritually complacent. I may fundamentally disagree that this responsibility means keeping [3% of] the Old Covenant law, but I agree Christians should prayerfully consider their loyalty to the New Covenant in how they live. I believe that is what John was trying to express in his epistle.

Sin is lawlessness, and lawlessness is serious.

Here are some posts to help you move forward:

Sin Is The Transgression of The Law?
Antinomianism and Motivation of Heart
Two Trees - Two Covenants
Gardening With God, or Growing Spiritual Fruit
If You Love Me, Keep My Commandments
Law of Moses, Law of God

This post is somewhat of a loose series with the following articles:

Common Legalist Arguments - Part VIII
The Sabbath Rest of Hebrews 4
The Sabbath Rest of Genesis 2
The Sabbath Rest of Isaiah 66
The Sabbath Rest of John 14

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Acts 17:11

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